Holbrook Lecture: Alvia Wardlaw

Alvia J. Wardlaw is a director/curator of the University Museum at Texas Southern University and professor of art history. She has mentored countless students of color to pursue careers in the museum field ranging from curatorial to conservation positions. As curator of modern and contemporary art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, for 22 years, Wardlaw organized over 75 exhibitions on African and African American art ranging from retrospectives of John Biggers and Kermit Oliver to the creative designs of the quiltmakers of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, to contemporary African art and the self- taught genius Thornton Dial. The first African American to receive the PhD in art history from the University of Texas at Austin, Wardlaw currently serves on the boards of the Orange Show Foundation and the Emancipation Park Conservancy in Houston and was recently appointed as honorary trustee by Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She continues to serve on the Scholarly Advisory Committee of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and is a trustee of Wellesley College.

Her lecture “All of One Piece: The Life and Art of Mary Lee Bendolph” will focus on the remarkable artistic career of quiltmaker Mary Lee Bendolph and will examine the interconnectedness of the artist’s creative visual energy and her life as a parent and homemaker, a caregiver and a leader in her community. Bendolph’s optimism throughout her life, despite hardship and challenges, is central to her approach to making art. The presentation will examine how through her quiltmaking and printmaking, or just as easily through singing, cooking and conversing with strangers, Mary Lee Bendolph approaches life in a manner that is immediate, improvisational and filled with joyful and spiritual energy. The talk will begin with the introduction of Ms. Mary Lee’s voice to the country through the Pulitzer Prize–winning article “Crossing Over” to the recognition of her incomparable works of art in the award-winning exhibition “The Quilts of Gee’s Bend” to her subsequent explorations of the medium of printmaking, while serving always as a moving yet loving force in her beloved Gee’s Bend, Alabama.

This event is a UGA Signature Lecture. For more Signature Lectures, visit: https://provost.uga.edu/news-events/events/signature-lectures.